Pandemic eviction crisis leads to greater tenant protections

NEWPORT NEWS, Va. (AP) — In a mostly empty conference room at a Virginia cultural arts center, Tara Simmons was looking for someone who might help her stave off eviction.

Simmons, a 44-year-old home health aide who lives with her two children and two grandchildren, was only a month behind on her rent. But that didn't stop her landlord from ordering her out of the house by Saturday, when the federal eviction moratorium ended.

Already enduring health problems, Simmons said she feared she would be out on the street.

“I’ve been in my house for four years now. And two months before my lease was up, I get an email saying that they weren’t renewing my lease,” said Simmons of Newport News, Virginia. “That’s it. No explanation why or whatever."

“I’ve been trying to find somewhere to move since I got that. I still haven’t been able to find a way to move because of the economy. ... This pandemic is hard.”

As a state lawmaker made a few remarks and others grabbed free lunch, Simmons connected with attorneys from the Legal Aid Society of Eastern Virginia. They advised her that her landlord needed a court order to get her out. She was safe for now.

The Virginia event in late July is part of a growing national movement — bolstered by tens of billions of dollars in federal rental assistance — to find ways to keep millions of at-risk tenants hurt by the coronavirus pandemic in their homes.

The push has the potential to reshape a system long skewed in favor of landlords that has resulted in about 3.7 million evictions a year — about seven every minute — according to the Eviction Lab at Princeton University. Many are Black and Latino families.

“This is an opportunity not to go back to normal, because for so many renters around the country, normal is broken,” Matthew Desmond, author of...